Former National Labor Relations Board member Gwynne Wilcox sued the Trump administration on Wednesday over her abrupt removal from the agency last week.
“The President’s removal of Ms. Wilcox without even purporting to identify any neglect of duty or malfeasance, and without notice or a hearing, defies ninety years of Supreme Court precedent that has ensured the independence of critical government agencies like the Federal Reserve,” states the complaint, which was filed in D.C. district court.
“The President’s action against Ms. Wilcox is part of a string of openly illegal firings in the early days of the second Trump administration that are apparently designed to test Congress’s power to create independent agencies like the Board,” the complaint continues.
The outcome of the case will likely have ramifications for other independent agencies in the executive branch and determine whether they can be insulated from the president’s reach. In firing Wilcox, the Trump administration flouted a federal statute that said NLRB board members can only be removed “for neglect of duty or malfeasance in office, but for no other cause.”
In its Jan. 27 letter to Wilcox and general counsel Jennifer Abruzzo, a fellow Democratic appointee who was simultaneously removed, the White House stated that part of the National Labor Relations Act “does not operate as a restriction on [the president’s] ability to remove Board members.”
Though Abruzzo’s firing was widely expected, Wilcox’s unprecedented removal has left the NLRB without the quorum necessary to rule on cases, grinding much of the agency’s most consequential work to a standstill.
Wilcox is asking the court to declare that she remains a “rightful member of the Board and that the President lacks authority to remove her” outside of the process outlined by the NLRA.
The White House did not immediately return a request for comment. A Trump administration official previously told POLITICO Wicox and Abruzzo were “far-left appointees with radical records of upending longstanding labor law, and they have no place as senior appointees in the Trump Administration, which was given a mandate by the American people to undo the radical policies they created.”
The administration has similarly dismantled the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission — which enforces workplace antidiscrimination laws — by removing two Democratic commissioners and its Biden-appointed top lawyer.
The ousted EEOC commissioners have also threatened to challenge their own removals, while the general counsel — Karla Gilbride — joined a government watchdog group that is suing the Trump administration over other matters.
The White House’s position that it holds near-unlimited authority to shape the executive branch to the president’s liking could tee up the Supreme Court to revisit a precedent known as Humphrey’s Executor that, for nearly a century, has served as the foundation for the constitutionality of independent agencies.
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